R devel - Nov 2008 - Suggestions for improving R-FAQ

Currently, if you were to print out the R frequently asked questions
(http://cran.r-project.org/doc/FAQ/R-FAQ.html), it would be 132 pages
long.  Is it any wonder that so many question could be answered by
looking at the FAQ but are not?   Here are a few (contentious)
suggestions to improve the document.

 * Remove the complete list of R packages

 * Include a complete list of frequently asked questions at the top of
the document

 * Move the introduction to the end - none of this information is
immediately useful for the person who is using the document

 * Move section seven, which includes the most frequently asked
questions to the start

 * Make "Why doesn't R think these numbers are equal?" the first
FAQ
since it is the most commonly asked

 * Remove infrequently asked questions - e.g. 2.3, 2.4, 7.9, 7.11,
7.12, 7.15, 7.19, 7.23, 7.28

 * Move sections 3, 6 and 9 into its their own documents

Regards,

Hadley


-- 
http://had.co.nz/

On Tue, Nov 25, 2008 at 12:41 PM, hadley wickham <h.wickham at gmail.com>
wrote:
> Currently, if you were to print out the R frequently asked questions
> (http://cran.r-project.org/doc/FAQ/R-FAQ.html), it would be 132 pages
> long.  Is it any wonder that so many question could be answered by
> looking at the FAQ but are not?   Here are a few (contentious)
> suggestions to improve the document.
>
> ...
+ Add a new FAQ - does R use multiple cores.

Hadley




-- 
http://had.co.nz/

Hadley,

These are good suggestions.
>  * Remove infrequently asked questions - e.g. 2.3, 2.4, 7.9, 7.11,
> 7.12, 7.15, 7.19, 7.23, 7.28
I'd like to lobby to keep 7.23 and 7.28. I still get questions about those.

Sampling bias might be an issue: we don't get questions (to r-help)
for those because those are in the FAQ. Perhaps that is wishful
thinking on my part.

-- 

Max